Investment Property Mortgages in Ontario

Twenty percent minimum for a property you will not live in, and that is a hard floor, because mortgage insurance is not available on non-owner-occupied property. If you plan to live in one unit of a two to four unit building, the rules change completely and you can get in for as little as five percent. That distinction is worth understanding before you start shopping, because it changes your buying power entirely.

It depends on the lender, and the spread between them is wide. Some add a share of the rent to your income, commonly around half. Others subtract the expenses from the rent and count only what is left. On the same property with the same file, two lenders can land in different places on whether you qualify at all.

This is the single biggest reason an investor file is worth shopping properly rather than taking to whoever holds your current mortgage.

Not directly. OSFI clarified how a lender must classify a mortgage where repayment depends materially on the property’s own rental income, which it calls income-producing residential real estate. That classification decides how much capital the lender has to hold against the loan, and OSFI has said plainly that it does not change the Guideline B-20 rules you qualify under.

What it can move is lender appetite and pricing on rental files, because a loan that costs a lender more to hold gets priced accordingly. That is a good reason to compare lenders on a rental purchase rather than assume the one you already bank with is the answer.

There is no universal cap, but the lenders change as you grow. Most standard lenders get uncomfortable past four or five properties, and beyond that you move toward lenders who underwrite the portfolio rather than the person. The mistake we see most often is someone structuring their first two purchases in a way that blocks the third without them noticing. Structure early for where you want to end up.

That is a tax question before it is a mortgage question, so it starts with your accountant. What we can tell you is the financing consequence: holding property corporately narrows your lender options, usually costs a little more, and often requires a personal guarantee anyway. If the tax case is strong it can still be the right call. Just make the decision with both halves of it on the table.